Texas is reporting two more cases of measles.
There were no measles cases in 2024, but 2025 is a different story. There have been four reported this year, and it's still January. Both cases were in unvaccinated school-age children in Gaines County and were hospitalized in Lubbock. They've since been discharged.
These newly identified cases are in addition to two others in unvaccinated residents of Harris County earlier this month. The Harris County cases were the first confirmed measles cases in Texas since 2023. The virus can remain in the air for up to two hours after an infected person leaves the area.
Vaccination rates have dropped since the 1980s, partly because of vaccine misinformation.
"I think of parents who don't vaccinate their kids as kind of victims of the disinformation campaign that's out there," Baylor's Dr. Peter Hotez said. "They're being provided misleading information from anti-vaccine activist groups, and they don't understand that measles is a serious illness."
He said Measles is highly contagious and 20% of kids who get it require hospitalization. Hotez notes the vaccine has been around since the early 1960's.
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